LFF: Leyla Bouzid reveals family’s reaction to In a Whisper
After directing As I Open My Eyes and A Tale of Love and Desire, Tunisian filmmaker Leyla Bouzid is back with her new drama In a Whisper.
Starring Eya Bouteraa, In a Whisper follows Lilia, who returns home to Tunisia after her uncle dies, forcing her to face family who don’t know anything about her Paris life or relationships. As she investigates his mysterious death, Lilia uncovers some family secrets.
I had the pleasure of meeting Bouzid at the BFI’s Filmmaker Afternoon Teas event during the London Film Festival. During our conversation, I discovered the autobiographical aspects of the film, some of the challenges, and that it was filmed in Bouzid’s late grandmother’s house.
What inspired you to tell this particular story?
The starting point of the film is really the house of my grandmother, where I shot the film. When my grandmother died, my family decided to sell the house of my grandmother. It’s a house that was always inspiring me- images, souvenirs, things – because I spent all my childhood holidays in it. I asked my family, ‘Please wait (until) I shot a film in it and then sell it’ and my family accepted, which is really a big luck. And so, this was the starting point.
The starting point also was the souvenir I had as a child in there. And with the house, there was the heart of the house, which was my grandmother, and also her particular relationship with my uncle, which, as a child, I was seeing him as a mystery. There was something I didn’t get about him. And there was a lot of, you know, sadness around his life, plus the mystery, and little by little, when I grew up, I found out he’s a guy of another generation, that he was gay, but no one accepted it, and they married him and all this. So I wanted to do a story about him and his grandmother, and so this was really the starting point of the film.
I love that you got to shoot in your grandmother’s house before it got sold. To have all your childhood memories there, and then to have the memory of making this, must be so nice.
Yeah, it’s very deep and strong. It’s not that easy, but it’s very, very strong.
What do your family think of the film?
All the cousins that have my age, they are very proud and happy. They thank me for having kept the memory of the house and the memory of some scenes, because the story of the house is fiction, but the characters and the scenes, there is something always close to what we were living. So, all my generation is really very happy, and the generation before, it’s not as easy, but everyone is quite satisfied with the film. But the film makes them wonder about a lot of things. It’s not that easy, but everyone in the end is positive.
Oh, that’s good. Were you nervous to show it to them at first?
Yes, I was.
How long have you been working on this, from start to finish?
The thing is that when I asked my family to keep the house (in which) I made the film, I had another project at that time that was really going to be made. So, I started to write the first ideas at that time, which was 2019 (or) something. But it was really just to put the ideas (down), but I knew that I had another project. Then I did another project and I took back this one. So, maybe we can say three and a half years.
When the production got underway, what were the biggest challenges?
There was a lot of challenge because the film is full of challenge. One of the challenges was to create a family that seems like a real family and that every relation seems like a real relationship inside the big family, because it’s a three-generation story with the grandmother, the aunt, the uncle, all the cousins. So, it’s a big family. And to create this big family was a big challenge.
I imagine casting that many people must have taken a long time.
It’s a challenge, but at the same time it’s very passionate. It’s intense, but it’s a nice step. When you find the people, it’s nice. You see them coming out, and when it works, it’s really beautiful.
Is there a scene or sequence or just something about it that you’re most proud of?
Yes, there are moments that I’m very, very proud of. It’s the scenes where I experiment something in the way of telling it. So, in the film, there is a mix between the main character as an adult and a child in the same shot… And these scenes I’m very, very proud of. And there is another scene which is a bit experimental, and it works very well. And this, I’m very, very proud of. It’s a scene with fixed images with photos that are souvenirs and then it jumps into a real scene.
Are you working on anything now, or are you still out there promoting In a Whisper?
No, I’m working on something. I promote the film and I’m very happy to do so, but it takes a lot of energy and space. It’s a very important step, but I’m working on something else. You always have to have another project in mind.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity
In a Whisper screened during the London Film Festival. It is currently without a release date